Exploring the Dystopian World of Umurangi Generation
Upon booting up Umurangi Generation for the first time, players are dropped into the streets of Tauranga, New Zealand in an alternate dystopian timeline set in the 2090s. But unlike the clean, green image associated with New Zealand, Tauranga has been transformed into a gritty cyberpunk landscape marred by the physical and societal consequences of climate crisis. Extreme weather and rising sea levels have damaged infrastructure and displaced communities, leading to the rise of sprawling shantytowns stretching along the coast.
I still vividly remember my first moments arriving in Tauranga. As my character Maoriland Dreamer, I emerged from an underground shelter to find a city ripe for photographic exploration. The vivid graffiti art adorning concrete walls contrasted with hazy skies tinted orange from wildfire smog drifting up from Australia. The streets buzzed with youth defiantly expressing themselves through fashion, hairstyles, tattoos and augmentations. Hardened riot police gazed ominously from armored vehicles.
While striking at first, closer inspection revealed neglected civic institutions and homes precariously erected on weathered hillsides. The shimmering harbor contained more floating slums than ships, with a towering seawall the only line of defense from rising tides and intensified storms. Initial wonder quickly transformed into haunting realization – this was a world both hyper-adapted to crisis yet still profoundly vulnerable.
Corporations have largely taken the place of public services, exemplified by the presence of Hephaestus Corporation emergency response units rather than traditional paramedics. At the same time, the United Nations has established itself as an occupying military force maintaining order through shows of force and surveillance, viewed with suspicion and contempt by many locals. However, despite the run-down setting, the youth culture of the city continues to thrive through art, music, and creativity.
As a freelance photographer denoted as “Maoriland Dreamer”, players have the opportunity to capture snapshots of daily life that reveal major themes regarding the failures of neoliberal governance, capitalist exploitation of natural disasters, frustrations with international responses to the climate crisis, anger at state violence channeled into protest movements, and an overarching cultural escapism in the face of existential threats.
The Failures of Neoliberalism
A core theme throughout Umurangi Generation is a seething frustration with decades of neoliberal governance that failed to address the climate crisis or invest in vital infrastructure and public services. Instead, rampant privatization has left communities themselves to cope with the devastating consequences of climate change accelerated by capitalist growth-above-all priorities.
In an early photography mission titled “INSTANT NOODLES”, players meet a homeless man heating up a meal along a dirty canal, a quiet moment that highlights issues of inequality and poverty exacerbated by years of austerity. Other missions encourage players to capture broken-down cyborg enhancement clinics, highlighting issues of healthcare privatization, as well as crumbling educational and civic institutions indicative of chronic disinvestment in public goods.
Overwhelmed by compounding crises and abandoned by the state, many locals have resigned themselves to making the best of their circumstances through cultural escapism and ad-hoc mutual aid networks among neighbors. The broader failures of decades of neoliberal policies have forced communities themselves to cope with disasters rather than preventing them or building resilience.
Disaster Capitalism and Privatization
In addition to depicting how decades of austerity leave communities exposed, Umurangi Generation also focuses specifically on how disasters are exploited for corporate profits within a neoliberal framework. Known as “disaster capitalism”, private industries work in tandem with government actors to implement exploitative free market policies and override public concerns during times of crisis.
This manifests clearly during certain missions depicting the predatory practices of Hephaestus Corporation, a paramilitary megacorporation that has largely privatized emergency response services. Players can witness how HC security forces violently displace disaster victims from valuable real estate and capture photos of excess force used against those interfering with HC objectives.
As just one example early on, I took an assignment to document HC rendering medical aid to earthquake victims. But upon arrival, the true focus became forcibly removing families from public housing declared structurally unsound. Violent scuffles broke out as angry crowds were dispersed with shock batons and tear gas before bulldozers razed buildings to the ground. This created space for luxury waterfront development far from public reach.
All while snapping photos asHC medics ignored cries for help from injured protestors, titling my work “The Empathy of Progress” as cutting critique. Beyond just generating images for my unknown clients, the game empowered me to create artistic condemnation of rampant human rights abuses.
Other subtle details similarly highlight privatization in a time of crisis. Corporate sponsorship logos can be seen emblazoned across humanitarian aid packages and shelters, reflecting how private funding comes with strings attached even for basic necessities. Billboards boasting HC’s vision for “sustainable prosperity” reveal a capitalist savior complex divorced from community accountability.
The central photography client that players sell photos to is similarly shrouded in mystery, reflective of broader unaccountable powers coordinating behind the scenes. Ultimately, Umurangi Generation presents numerous examples of how disasters facilitate unchecked corporate rule rather than just transitions focused on building local resilience.
Anger at International Organizations
In addition to frustrations with domestic governance, Umurangi Generation also heavily features resentment towards outside international bodies perceived to poorly manage humanitarian aid responses. This anger stems both from perceptions of incompetence as well as fears of more insidious military occupation.
The United Nations’ peacekeeping forces, sporting black masks and riot gear, can be seen posted up across the shantytowns and ruined neighborhoods of Tauranga. These soldiers restrict civilian movements using violence and surveillance tools like drones without community oversight. It becomes apparent that outside aid often comes with exterior geopolitical objectives beyond helping disaster victims rebuild.
Some missions even depict locals directly sabotaging and attacking UN equipment in order to undermine the outside presence. At one point, players meet a character who laments restrictions preventing him from practicing indigenous fishing traditions, exemplifying cultural losses that often accompany international development schemes.
Beyond explicit force, the game also features symbolic references highlighting international exploitation. At the Tauranga waterfront lined with half-sunken buildings, an art installation spells out the phrase “the ocean does not belong to us” using discarded refrigerators and stoves. This work protests outsider overfishing practices that accelerate ecological decline.
As I explored the piers and harbors of Tauranga, I discovered makeshift fishing villages precariously erected on aging, oil-leaking ships run aground near chemical plants. Graffiti tags read “Not For Sale” in protest of the government‘s proposed redevelopment schemes. Inside the vessels, displays proudly showcased limited catch from waters polluted by offshore drilling. This highlighted the struggle for food security and sovereignty facing marginilized people under internationally dominated systems.
Ultimately, anger depicted towards foreign presences reflects real post-colonial tensions that arise when outside aid comes with ulterior motives beyond community development. The game suggests a need to reconcile these complex power dynamics for just climate action.
Protest Against State Violence
Alongside its broader societal commentaries, Umurangi Generation also includes story content exploring protest movements that emerge in response to state violence and exploitation. Players unlock missions centered around public demonstrations against police brutality, deadly forced evictions of shantytowns by corporate security forces, and the criminalization of homelessness by municipal authorities.
During these chapters, players step into the role of frontline journalists capturing images of nonviolent resistance as well as the aggressive police crackdowns that often follow. Iconography including riot shields and Molotov cocktails pay homage to historical and contemporary protest imagery ranging from Paris 1968 to Hong Kong’s 2014 Umbrella Movement. Other details like chants of “the world is watching” emphasize protest as an appeal to global consciousness.
In my first brush covering civil unrest, I shadowed crowds marching against increasingly draconian public order laws used to crackdown on labor strikes and environmental blockades. Waves of drummers kept tempo as flag-bearing youth leaders took bullhorns directing chants. What began as a peaceful show of force soon met columns of corporate enforcers wielding tear gas and LRAD sonic weapons.
Chaos erupted as I found myself dodging rubber bullets to capture images of nonviolent elderly singing traditional indigenous songs while kneeling, defiantly blocking riot police. Suddenly the booming crack of flashbangs followed by anguished screams. My lens captured the immediate aftermath of violent police reprisal. I titled the image simply “Why?”, my small act of solidarity.
The clashes between largely youth-led social movements and heavily armored riot police reinforce themes about deep failures of vision by established power structures unwilling to accommodate rising activist voices. State institutions dependent on violence to enforce unpopular edicts, rather than engaging with the public and reckoning with policy failures.
However, the game also attempts to spotlight hope and solidarity generated through grassroots mobilization. Player-characters openly stand in solidarity with fictionalized protest movements for climate justice and against police brutality as fellow members of an oppressed generation. Ultimately, the game suggests that direct action may awaken societal change even within its gloomy dystopian setting.
Cultural Escapism
Surrounding its more direct societal commentaries, Umurangi Generation also dedicates much of its runtime to exploring cultural escapism embraced by youth in response to compounding political and environmental crises. Side activities include dance competitions, space rocket art projects, costume parties, graffiti artwork, and more.
Developers Orlando and Naphtali Faulkner have cited New Zealand’s vibrant and defiant arts scene in the wake of traumatic events as a core inspiration. For example, music and street art became outlets for coping and cultural identity following deadly earthquakes. The game emulates how art facilitates resilience and community bonds.
Among my early photography assignments, I documented an underground nightclub where augmented reality interfaces painted surreal alien dreamscapes onto dancing youth. Layers of holograms transformed broken interior foundations into visions ripped from collective hopes and memories. In that liminal space where real and unreal intermingled into utopian fantasies, revelers temporarily escaped waking anxieties through movement, community, and creation beyond limits.
Examination of player-created photographs also reveals much about how gamers engage with escapist themes. Creative photography using lenses and lighting to focus on character expressions and colorful cityscapes provides one avenue of imagination. As another example, players often use selfie photo mode during dance competitions to embrace the atmosphere of celebration.
This type of optional content creates breathing room to temporarily forget the dystopian setting before the game loops back into its more critical themes. Ultimately, this cyclical experience emulates patterns in real culture where calls for systemic change mix with a desire for communal joy. Umurangi Generation argues that embracing even fleeting moments of beauty remains vital for well-being and perseverance.
Conclusion
From the streets of Tauranga to imagined international conferences, Umurangi Generation provides a window into anxieties regarding an uncertain future shaped by climate crisis and unchecked corporate influence permeating all levels of society. However, even as a grim warning, the game retains a shred of hope that committed activists and communities may yet redeem humanity’s future as long as complacency does not take hold.
The immersive dystopian photographer fantasy game joins a rich lineage of climate fiction works that encourage audiences to grapple with existential societal threats. By experiencing this artistically crafted world first-hand as Maoriland Dreamer, I witnessed the societal fissures and inequalities that emerge when governments abdicate responsibilities during times of crisis.
Watching protest movements chant that “another world is possible” during defiant marches, I photographed the community resilience that emerges even from dystopia’s rubble. And losing myself dancing amidst vibrant holographic dreamscapes, I embodied the role of arts in sustaining even the most vulnerable communities. Ultimately, Umurangi Generation transformed me from distant observer to direct participant within a strangely uncanny yet revealing future.
Humanity now stands at a critical crossroads with challenges like climate change threatening life as we know it over the coming decades. Artists play a vital role in navigating these uncharted waters across potential timelines, both utopian and catastrophic. By exploring speculative worlds like Umurangi Generation we open portals to glimpse challenges ahead, while also sparking timely discussions that may yet steer reality toward more compassionate and sustainable outcomes.